


You Wouldn't Have to Fake It

by justlikesomuch



Category: Crooked Media RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Actors, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-02
Packaged: 2020-10-24 07:28:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20702201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justlikesomuch/pseuds/justlikesomuch
Summary: Lovett and Tommy could perform any scene from any play for Ira's assignment. It just happens to be this exerpt from the classicIn the Arms of the Same Sea. Any resonance between the material and the actors' feelings about each other is strictly coincidental.





	You Wouldn't Have to Fake It

**Author's Note:**

  * For [moogle62](https://archiveofourown.org/users/moogle62/gifts).

> Remix of the [in the arms of the same sea](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11858145) by moogle62.
> 
> The text of the play-within-the-story consists of portions of the wonderful source material, formatted and adapted as a script.
> 
> Thank you to [redacted], the world’s finest beta.

** _Jon’s house, the morning after the party. Tommy wakes up after an indeterminate amount of time asleep. It could be anything from an hour to a day; his internal clock feels skewed and fuzzy. The bed he’s sleeping in smells like Jon’s laundry detergent._ **

** _He lies there for a minute, weighing up whether he can roll over and go back to sleep or whether he really does have to get up for the bathroom, but inevitably biology wins. He navigates the dark hallway without bumping into anything, and he’s done and on his way back when Jon’s door opens._ **

**\- - - - - -**

Favs stops reading aloud.

“Where did you find this scene, Lovett? Your characters are named ‘Jon’ and ‘Tommy?’” He shakes his head and rolls his eyes at Tommy. 

Lovett stares at him in scornful disbelief.

“Are you seriously telling me,” he says, “that you are unfamiliar with _ In the Arms of the Same Sea? _ What did you even _ do _in drama school? Amazing. Back me up here, Tommy.”

Tommy doesn’t feel like telling Lovett he’s never read the play, either. He’d honestly been a little surprised to see the names in the script, too.

“All I’m saying,” Favs says, “is that it fits completely with my understanding of you that you would pick a scene for Ira’s assignment just because it has your fucking name in it.”

“Oh, of course,” says Lovett, “I see your point. It’s completely inconceivable that someone would be named ‘Jon’”

“Jon AND Tommy?” Favs shoots back.

“Leave me out of this,” Tommy says.

“Why, what scene are you guys doing?” Lovett asks.

Favs shrugs. “Emily picked something from _ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” _

“Ohoho, of _ course _that's what you would end up with!” Lovett throws his hands wide, as though Favs has just made his point for him. What that point is, exactly, Tommy’s not sure.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Favs’ tone is outraged, but his face is already melting into inevitable fondness. Tommy knows the feeling. Lovett has that effect on people.

Lovett smiles at Favs, and then at Tommy. It’s a pleased little closed-mouth smile that Tommy recognizes and loves. It’s nice that they’re all living in L.A. now, with Favs and Emily right across the street from the house Lovett and Tommy are renting, taking classes together. Tommy always secretly hoped they’d end up like this, even when Lovett was in New York.

“Whatever,” Lovett sighs. “Let’s finish this up so we can order lunch. Jon, just sit there, look pretty and read the stage directions without commenting. Do you think you can manage that?”

Favs nods.

“Great.” Lovett glances down at the script on his phone. “Tommy, pick it up from the first line.

***

**TOMMY: Shit. Did I wake you up?**

**JON: What’re you doing up? What time is it? Is it even a time?**

**TOMMY: Sure it is. Don’t know what time though.**

** _Jon yawns and scratches the back of his neck._ **

**TOMMY: Hey. Remember D.C.?**

**JON: Huh?**

** _Tommy turns to address the audience. Jon freezes in position as though the scene is continuing without him._ **

**TOMMY: I know you remember. The night before you left. Your bags were waiting by the door. We ended up pressed together on the couch, you panting against my throat like you were dying. We were tangled so close I could feel your heartbeat. Tell me you remember. Your mouth tasted like beer, and your hands under my shirt—that was the best damn thing I’d ever felt. **

**\- - - - - **

“Cut,” Ira calls out, rising from his seat in the front of the theater and walking to the edge of the stage.

“Tommy,” he says.

“Yup.” This is the third time Ira’s interrupted with notes, and each time it was feedback for Tommy.

“Where are you?” Ira smiles, but his eyes are sharp. 

“Sorry?” Tommy’s not sure how to answer. “What do you—”

“What’s going on with your character right now? Is he, I don’t know, delivering a political speech? Dumping exposition? What’s your understanding of what he’s doing? Why is he talking to the audience?” 

“He, uh, I’m . . .” Tommy’s been afraid Ira might ask him that exact question. He’s been asking it of himself. He senses there’s a right answer, something Ira wants to hear.

“Lovett?” Ira turns to him. “What’s going on with Tommy here? Tommy the character, that is.”

“He’s, um,” Lovett glances apologetically at Tommy, hesitating uncharacteristically. He doesn’t want to show Tommy up. 

Tommy is simultaneously grateful for Lovett’s concern, and relieved to have the pressure off him.

“He’s going inside his head,” says Lovett. “He’s stepping outside of what’s going on with him and Jon in the moment to remember what happened between them years ago.”

Ira nods, motioning for Lovett to continue.

“It’s too, it’s too intense to talk to Jon about, so he addresses him in his mind, and, um, so he recalls how it felt back then, and—”

“Right! You’re _ in _ the memory,” Ira says, turning to Tommy. “You’re tasting him and feeling him, and you’re sharing that with the audience because it’s too hard to share it with Jon. So give me some emotion here, some sense memory.”

Tommy wishes Lovett had picked literally any other scene. Tommy doesn’t want to think about, whatever, tasting Lovett, or rather, Jon-not-Lovett. He wants to stay at arm's length, watching Lovett from within the safety of his character. But he nods as though he understands what Ira wants from him, and resumes his monologue.

Ira watches him from the stage’s edge, but doesn’t interrupt again. Tommy guesses that’s an encouraging sign. He’s always been good at appearing present.

***

Tommy and Lovett stop to pick up tacos on the way home after class. It’s a beautiful night, even by springtime-in-L.A. standards, so they sit out on the porch and finish their late dinner. 

Lovett is doing his Ira impression, and Tommy can’t stop laughing long enough to take a swig of his beer. It’s a mediocre impression that Tommy’s seen a hundred times, but he can’t help laughing until his ribs hurt. Lovett just does that to him. Tommy always wants more of his nonsense.

Lovett has a bit of sour cream on his cheek, and Tommy reaches over automatically to wipe it off with his thumb. Lovett’s cheek is warm, and Tommy is hit with a sudden, mortifying desire to lick the tip of his own thumb, to make it weird, ruin the moment.

Lovett watches him, dark eyes serious. Tommy holds his gaze, saying nothing.

“What?” says Lovett.

“Nothing, I,” Tommy grasps for a way to move past the awkwardness he’s created, recapture the comfortable intimacy that came before it. “What do you think about D.C.?”

“D.C.?” Lovett looks confused.

“In the scene we’re doing for class. Like, the back story. What happened between them? Does the rest of the play get into that?” Tommy doesn’t know why his brain grabbed this topic as a life raft at this particular moment. It’s something he’s been wondering about, though.

Lovett laughs.

“Wait, you’ve never read the play either?”

Tommy shrugs, and Lovett sighs.

“What is going on with America’s undergraduate theater programs?”

“I um, I saw the movie when it came out.” Tommy remembers his college girlfriend squeezing his hand in the small arthouse theater, remembers the confusion of thinking Jay Duplass was maybe kind of hot? Just objectively speaking? “But the adaptation doesn’t really get into—”

This just makes Lovett bury his head in his hands.

Tommy nudges Lovett’s leg with the toe of a sock-clad foot. Lovett flops over comically, like Tommy’s cultural illiteracy is sapping his strength.

“Don’t be a snob. I never got around to this one. Educate me.”

Lovett’s eyes flash on him briefly. He leans back in his wicker chair and looks out across the street toward Favs and Emily’s place.

“The play doesn’t really get into much detail about it. Just, like, they were roommates.”

Roommates.

“And there was kind of a slow burn situation between them, and then . . .”

“Yeah?”

“Just what it says in that bit of monologue you have. Jon was about to leave D.C., and they, uh, they hooked up.”

“And then never talked about it.”

“Right,” Lovett says quietly.

“Until the scene we’re doing.”

They sit in silence for a minute, until Tommy can formulate his question.

“Do you think . . .” He’s not sure how to say the rest.

“Yeah?”

“Do you think Jon was thinking about it, that whole time? Just in terms of, you know, in terms of informing our scene.”

Jon doesn’t respond right away. His eyes are still focused somewhere across the street. 

“Yeah,” he says, without turning to look at Tommy. “I think he was just waiting for Tommy.”

***

It’s easy enough, reading a script, to know that two characters belong together. It’s obvious that they’re pining for each other, that someone just needs to make a move.

Real life is never as simple. Tommy’s seen enough friendships crumble because of asymmetrical feelings, or misinterpreted signals, to know that relationships are messier off the page. 

Sometimes he’s even been the one avoiding someone’s calls because of the guilt of not liking them the way he wants to. More often, he’s let his longing sit unexamined and unvoiced, refusing to risk what he already has.

It was one thing to think “what if” when Lovett was across the country. Tommy could forget all the moments during the years of their graduate program when he could have taken a chance, and he didn’t. He told himself that if the right moment presented itself, he wouldn’t let Lovett slip away again.

Now their lives are completely intertwined again—sharing a house, their best friends living close by. They struggle to do right by Ira and try to improve their craft together. They help each other prepare for auditions. They go to the gym together and spend most evenings side-by-side on the couch.

It’s good, just like this. There’s a closeness between them that almost feels like enough. Enough for Tommy to let the opportunities to reach for more pass by again and again. Because as much as he wants to find out what might happen if he told Lovett the truth, he can’t risk losing what he already has.

***

** _Tommy turns back to Jon, and the scene continues._ **

**JON: D.C., Tommy? You mean the place we lived and worked for years? The political center of the country? No, yeah, ringing no bells. Where are you going with this?”**

** _Tommy crosses the hallway to him._ **

**TOMMY: Here.**

** _He drops to his knees. Jon makes a strangled noise and doesn’t move away._ **

**\- - - - -**

“Hot,” Louis says appreciatively, breaking from reading.

“Louis,” says Lovett, “If you are about to tell me that you are unfamiliar with this play, I fucking swear.”

Louis rolls his eyes.

“Okay, calm down, Lovett,” says Louis. “How long have we known each other? I can’t believe you would even imply such a thing. I’m from Illinois, not a cabin in the Ozarks.” He shoots Tommy a commiserating look.

Tommy wants to hate Louis, just from the way Lovett’s always going on about him—Louis was such a great roommate in New York, Louis knows all the best clubs, Louis has an encyclopedic memory, Louis is so fun to hang out with, blah blah blah.

But Louis is indeed a fantastic houseguest, and Tommy likes him in spite of his best efforts. He especially likes the way Louis acts like Lovett is a shared burden and privilege that he and Tommy must endure and delight in. It’s like the two of them are members of a long-suffering Lovett fan club, or co-owners of a very exasperating and endearing puppy.

“You’re lucky, Tommy, that you’re living with Lovett now that he’s _ mellowed _.” He waggles his eyebrows at Tommy as though he’s supposed to know what Louis means.

Tommy laughs and takes a drink of his beer, which must be his third—fourth? He feels loose and happy. Drinking while they run lines was a great idea. 

“This is Lovett mellowed?” Tommy laughs. “I can’t begin to contemplate that.” 

He tries to think back to grad school. Has Lovett changed much since then? 

“Just try to picture him at 24 in New York. There we are, sharing what one might generously call a two-bedroom apartment with thin walls, and _ this one _ . . .” Louis trails off and jabs a thumb in Lovett’s direction.

“Excuse me!” Lovett says, “If I recall, you were just as much or _ more _ of a—”

“Don’t you fucking say it,” Louis says, feigning outrage. “We were both having a bit of a _ phase. _”

He pronounces the last word in an emphatic murmur, looking at Tommy like they are on the same page.

Tommy’s not sure what to make of this. Tommy’s never had a phase. It’s hard to imagine Lovett having a phase. Lovett, who’s always bitching about the apps and opting to order dinner and stay in with Tommy to watch their shows, his feet in Tommy’s lap. Lovett, who’s barely dated since they moved in together.

“The difference,” Louis explains, “is that I went home with people, whereas Lovett was always bringing guys back to our tiny shared apartment.”

“Okay, first of all,” says Lovett, but Louis cuts him off.

“And the noise!” Louis continues, “The very drama of it all. Here I was, new to the city, out for like five minutes. Meeting only the most disappointing men one could conceive of.”

“Please,” says Lovett, “you did fine.”

“Meanwhile,” says Louis, ignoring him, “Lovett’s there on the other side of, as I said, a very thin wall, making noises I’ve never even _ heard _ before, begging an endless parade of pouty-lipped MFA types to fuck him harder, berating them for not trying hard enough.”

Lovett glares, but he can’t help laughing at the memory, and at Louis’ pantomime of his younger self furiously banging on the wall. 

Tommy tries to think of a way to change the subject.

“Listen, Louis,” says Lovett, “I think it’s time to let you in on a secret. Most of that was fake. I was meeting with a lot of disappointment, too.”

“Seriously?” says Louis. “You’re shaking up my whole narrative understanding of my 20s here.”

“What can I say?” Lovett says, with a forced cheer that Tommy hardly recognizes, “Sometimes you gotta fake it til you make it, right?”

“Well,” says Louis, slapping his thighs and standing up to stretch. He’s definitely had less to drink than Tommy has. “Lovett, Tommy, let’s hope our faking days are behind us. I have a date. Don’t wait up.”

**\- - - - - **

**JON: What are you doing? Tommy, what— **

**TOMMY: Can I? Do you want— **

**JON: Yes! Fucking hell, Tommy, yes. What are you even - how is that even a question? What did you think I was going to say?**

**TOMMY: You should say what you want. I want to know what you want.**

**JON: I thought you knew. I thought you knew what I wanted. It’s not like anyone can accuse me of being subtle, god, it’s not one of my many strengths. I thought you knew.**

**\- - - - - **

“Hey,” Lovett says, looking down at him. “Are we finishing the scene? You’re kind of spacing out.”

Tommy stands up, bracing himself on Lovett’s shoulder with one hand. The room is swaying slightly. He can’t take his eyes off Lovett’s face.

“Do you want to call it a night?” Lovett asks.

It isn’t right, Tommy thinks, the way it all unfolded. Lovett moving off to New York after grad school, Tommy stuck in Chicago, trying to figure his shit out and missing Lovett so, so much. 

All that was bad enough without knowing about this other part, about Lovett moaning performatively for a bunch of worthless people. He deserves so much more than that. He always has. It isn’t right, when all the time, when Tommy—

His hand is still on Lovett’s shoulder.

“Tommy?” Lovett sounds concerned.

“You wouldn’t have to fake it,” Tommy says. He hears how rough his voice sounds, and realizes that he’s said it out loud.

“What?”

“With me,” he says, his blood pounding in his ears. “You wouldn’t have to fake it if you were with me.”

“What are you—,” Lovett begins, but Tommy is already out of the room and headed to his bedroom. He shuts the door firmly behind him and flops down on his bed, dizzy.

Sleep doesn’t come. The adrenaline rush of his exchange with Lovett has sobered him up and jolted him wide awake.

There’s a knock on his door, and then Lovett tentatively opens it without waiting for a reply. He stands in the doorway.

“Sorry about that.” Tommy sighs. “I’m pretty drunk, I guess.”

“Can I come in?”

“Sure. Yeah.”

Lovett enters and sits down on the edge of Tommy’s bed. He’s so close to where Tommy’s feet are hanging off the bed that Tommy can feel his warmth through his sweats. The proximity makes Tommy’s heart rate pick up again.

“So,” Lovett starts, “I’m not really following the thread, but I gather your little, uh, dramatic outburst was in reference to our conversation with Louis earlier this evening?”

Tommy props himself up on his elbows and peers at Lovett through the darkness.

“Lovett, are _ you _ seriously calling _ me _dramatic?”

“Well,” says Lovett, “given the specifics of the situation—hey! Answer the question, Tommy!”

Tommy smiles. “You didn’t ask me a question.”

“Tommy!”

“Lovett!”

“Why are you being so bitchy? Did I do something to you?”

“No, it’s just . . .” He trails off, unsure what to say next. It’s easier with a script in front of him, a clear guideline of where to take the scene. He doesn’t know how to move them past this stuck place.

“Just what?”

“Why did you pick that scene for us, Lovett?”

“I told you, it’s—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Tommy rolls his eyes. “Don’t give me this crap about the emotional bareness, and the physical honesty or whatever. You could have chosen anything, and you decided we should do a scene about long-time friends admitting their feelings and hooking up?”

“I’m not sure what you’re suggesting,” says Lovett. His voice is even, betraying nothing.

“I think it’s obvious.”

“I want to hear you say it.”

“I think,” says Tommy, “I think you’re trying to poke around the edges of the subject without putting yourself out there and saying what you want. I think you picked it so it would force what’s going on between us to the surface.”

“So you think something’s going on between us?”

“Of course I—Lovett! Stop being so fucking careful!”

“How do you want me to be?”

“I want you to be brave!”

“Brave?” Lovett laughs. “Brave like what? Like boasting vaguely that you would make me scream the way I always pretended to do with everyone else, and then rushing out of the room with no follow-up? Is that the kind of courage you want from me?”

“Shut up,” says Tommy, but he can’t keep the smile out of his voice.

“You shut up,” says Lovett.

“Come here and make me,” Tommy says softly, reaching for him.

**\- - - - -**

**TOMMY: I didn’t know. What you wanted. I had no idea.**

**JON (fondly): Of course you didn’t. You can’t be expected to know things with that many muscles. It stunts the brain, I hear, all those fucking gym visits. Bad for the oxygen supply.**

**TOMMY: That isn’t remotely how science works.**

**\- - - - - **

“All right!” Ira calls out to them. “That’s what I’m looking for, that’s how we do it. Take notice, Favreau.”

He mock-glares at Favs, who clutches his chest and buries his head in Emily’s shoulder.

Ira selects the scene from _ In the Arms of the Same Sea _ for the student showcase. They’ll need to put in a lot of work to get it up to performance level, but Tommy doesn’t mind at all.

***

Later, after they’re done rehearsing for the night, they sit on the couch, picking apart the scene. 

“So what do you think happens next,” Tommy says, his fingers stroking light circles in Lovett’s hair. He still can’t believe he gets to touch Lovett anytime he feels like it.

“Huh?” Sleep is starting to creep into Lovett’s voice, but Tommy’s not ready for the evening to end.

“Our scene,” says Tommy. “It’s the last one of the play, right?”

“Yeah,” says Lovett.

“So, like, what do you imagine happening next,” Tommy says. “What happens after the scene ends?”

“Ah,” Lovett clears his throat and gently removes Tommy’s hand from his hair. “Well, we end with you on your knees, right?”

“Right.” Tommy feels a little thrill of anticipation.

“So, go on. Get on your knees.”

“What happens now?” Tommy says softly, looking up at Lovett.

“You tell me, Tommy.”

Tommy doesn’t want to push it too far. As well as he knows Lovett, this part is still so new. “Put your hand in my hair.”

Lovett does as he’s told. Tommy is glad he decided to grow out his hair a bit. Lovett can get a good grip at the back of Tommy’s head, just how he wants it.

“Then you would, um, you would tell me to suck you.”

“Hmm, I don’t know,” Lovett says, thoughtful, “It seems like it would be more in character for me to make you beg for it a little.”

Tommy takes a steadying breath and presses his face against the front of Lovett’s thigh, rubbing his cheek on the soft fabric of Lovett’s sweats. 

“You like that, don’t you,” Lovett says softly, reverent. “You want to beg for it.”

Tommy groans. He is so done for. “Please Lovett. Please can I suck your dick? I need it so bad.”

“You really do, don’t you?”

“I’ve waited so long.”

Lovett sighs and looks down at him, and they just smile at each other for a moment. It’s almost enough to take them out of the scene, but then Lovett picks it up.

“So go on, if you want it so bad.”

Tommy’s hands are shaking, but he pulls Lovett’s sweats and briefs down in a single movement. He gets his mouth on Lovett’s cock, tasting him, breathing him in, circling the tip with his tongue, drawing a moan from Lovett.

“It’s gentle at first,” says Lovett, his hands still gripping Tommy’s hair lightly.

“Mmm hmm,” Tommy agrees, kissing along the side of Lovett’s cock. He feels drunk with how badly he wants it. “But then . . .”

Lovett’s hands tighten in his hair, hesitating.

Tommy looks up at him.

“Do it,” he says.

“I told you to beg.”

Holy fuck. He looks up through his lashes. “Please, Lovett, _ Jon, _please, I—”

Lovett grabs his hair and shoves Tommy’s head down. Tommy moans and opens his mouth, taking Lovett’s cock down all the way, feeling a tight flush of relief as the head hits his soft palate, just on the edge of too much.

He yanks down his own sweats and gets a hand around his cock. He wants to draw it out, but he’s not going to last long tonight. From the way Lovett’s pulling in deep, gasping breaths and thrusting his hips to force himself deeper into Tommy’s mouth, he guesses he’s not the only one. 

Tommy pulls off, jacking Lovett while he catches his breath.

“You know, Lovett,” he says, nearly undone at how rough his own voice sounds, “you’re quieter than I thought you would be.”

“Yeah, well,” Lovett says, biting back a moan, “I was assured that I wouldn’t have to fake it.”

Tommy laughs and takes him down again. Later, there will be time to work Lovett open slowly, to get him properly into bed, to hold him down and fuck him so hard he won’t be able to even think about faking it. 

Just for now, though, Tommy has everything he needs in the world: Lovett’s ragged breathing in the quiet dark of the home they share. The sharp press of Lovett’s fingertips and smell of his skin. Waves of building pleasure cresting over him as Lovett fills his mouth and calls out his name.


End file.
